


FFVII Folk Tales: The Fire Bird

by ixieko



Series: FFVII Folk Tales [7]
Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Folklore, Gen, Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-03
Updated: 2016-01-03
Packaged: 2018-05-11 09:52:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5623117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ixieko/pseuds/ixieko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A woman finds a mysterious egg in a forest. Who is going to hatch from this egg?</p>
            </blockquote>





	FFVII Folk Tales: The Fire Bird

Long, long ago, an old man lived with his wife in an old, worn hut near the mouth of the river Surinda (The river that was flowing from the Knowlespeak to Modeo bay, completely frozen now. - M.). They lived together since youth, but gave birth to only one child, and even that child died during plague. The old man fished, and his wife, though old and white-haired, hunted, for she was still strong, her eyes were good and she rarely missed.

Once, the old woman went to the northern foothills to hunt for trickplays. When the night came, she set up camp and was preparing to go to sleep, when she heard cries, and when she looked in that direction, she saw lights. She ran there, with bow and arrow ready, and saw a bandersnatch attacking a big, yellow, shining bird. She shot the beast, but the bird was already badly wounded and fell to the ground.  
The woman went closer and searched her bag for a potion, but the bird spoke with human words, "Don't try to heal me, for I am already dying. Please, take care of my egg for me, bring my chick to my home, and I will help you when the time comes."  
"I promise to take care of your chick. Where is your home?" The woman asked.  
"It's on the highest point of Savun-Ureh (The Knowlespeak. - M.). You have to stay night there, or you will not see my temple, for during the day it's invisible, and in night it glows." With that, the bird flared up and in the moment was burned out. Only a few glowing feathers still lay on the ground, and a big purple egg. The woman took it, and wrapped it in her fur coat, and went back to the village.

All summer the woman carried the egg on her, warming it with her own body heat.  
"Throw it out," The old man grumbled, "It's rotten anyway."  
But she remembered her promise and believed that the chick will soon hatch.  
One day, she went to bathe and asked her husband to look after the egg. But when she left, the man decided to break the egg and see what was inside it. He took a hammer and hit the egg, and it cracked. He broke the pieces away, and looked inside, and instead of a chick he found a small girl that was sleeping, curled in a ball.  
When the woman returned, he lied to her that the egg hatched all by itself. She looked at the child, and didn't want to take her where the bird asked, and so they took the girl and called her their daughter, and gave her a name Anivun, or Gift.

For ten years the girl lived with them and thought they were her real parents. She grew up faster than other kids, and by the end of tenth year she looked like a young woman. She was strong and fast, and always warm, even in coldest of days.  
The old woman and her husband told her nothing of her real mother, for they were afraid that if they do, she will leave them.

In these ten years, winters became colder and colder, and when Anivun turned ten, the coldest of winters came. Snow covered trees up to their tops, and birds were freezing in the air and dropping on the ground dead. Animals such as rabbit and trickplay dug themselves deep burrows, others like wolf and bandersnatch made themselves dens in deep caves close to hot springs, and bears went to sleep in their lairs. People were hiding in their huts and yurts, insulated with pine branches and snow, and went outside only when necessary.  
One day, the old man went to the forest to gather firewood, for they had already used up all they stocked in summer. Anivun and her mother waited and waited, but he did not return. The woman went to search for him, and disappeared too, and the girl went to search for them both. The Sun already went to his sky house, when she found them, the man trapped by a fallen tree, and the woman exhausted and freezing. With her warm and strong hands, Anivun freed her father and brought him and her mother back to their hut, but could not warm them up.  
"My death is coming, Anivun," The old woman said. "And I have to tell you that I'm not your real mother. If you want to find out about her, go to the highest point of Savun-Ureh when Sun is sleeping, and look for a glowing temple."  
Anivun heard her words, and asked, "Why do you say this, mother? I'm your daughter."  
"She speaks truth," The old man said. "We only adopted you. You was not born as human children do, but hatched from the egg."  
The girl looked at him, and then at her mother, and then went out of the hut without any other word, didn't even put her fur coat on.

The night passed, and the day came, but still she did not return. Fire in the fireplace burned out, and it was cold in their hut.  
"Let's say our good-byes," The old man said. "I feel I'll not live much longer, wife."  
"If only our daughter was with us," The woman said, sighing. "She ran away only in her dress. What if she froze to death?"

Suddenly, the door opened, and Anivun entered. She went to her parents, knelt before them and said, "Thank you, mother, for taking care for me, as you promised." Then, she turned to her father and said, "As for you, father, why did you break the egg before time?"  
"I wanted to see what was inside it," The old man said, ashamed of himself.  
Anivun smiled at him and said, "If you waited until the egg hatched, I would be born knowing who am I. I am one of the daughters of Sun, and the same fire bird you, mother, saw dying in the forest. As all Sun's children, I'm immortal, and this is how I'm reborn. But thank you anyway, father, because I had a chance to be a human girl and to live with you."  
With that, she stood up, and swung her arms, and turned on the spot, and turned into a beautiful bird with yellow and red feathers, shining like Sun himself. She sang with her sweet voice, and flapped her wings, and her adoptive parents were healed from their freeze burns and felt warm.

"Will you stay with us?" The old woman asked.  
Anivun said, "Not for a long time, for I have my own duties. The land grew too cold while I was living with you, and I have to make it warm again. But I will return to you."

They say that she visited her adoptive parents until the day they died, and even after that she still sometimes comes to humans to help them in their times of need. She is the one who we pray for warm winters and for healing.

_(From “The tales of North”, Evan Marius, 1932)_

* * *

 

"What do you think, Grim? We have a location now: Knowlespeak."  
"Gast, Knowlespeak is one of the most well-studied places of the Northern continent. Do you think a glowing temple would stay unnoticed?"  
"Probably, they didn't look at it in night."  
"Or, more likely, this is just a legend. A bird that turns into a woman and back at will, and makes the weather warmer? Seriously?"  
"Could be a Cetra."  
"..."


End file.
